Activity-based learning is edu dept’s key focus

After facing flak for its poor academic standards, the UT education department has now decided to focus on application-based learning for primary classes (Class 1-5) to improve the quality of education in government schools. Two institutes —Regional Institute of English (RIE), Sector 32, and UT’s State Council of Education Research and Training (SCERT) — have been roped in to prepare worksheets to assist teachers in classroom evaluation.

Under the initiative, which has been undertaken by the department on the recommendation of the UT education secretary, RIE has been preparing worksheets for English while SCERT has been working on worksheets for mathematics, Hindi and environmental studies.

SCERT director Surinder Dhayia said the worksheets, which would be distributed in Classes 1 to 5 of all government schools soon, would result in better teaching in classrooms. The worksheets will comprise both texts and visuals.

“There is very limited exposure to application-based learning in NCERT books. Every book has limited activity exercises that create a hindrance for teachers to evaluate students. The worksheets will enable teachers to evaluate students after the completion of every chapter,” he said.

Dhayia said worksheets are still at the editing stage and will soon be sent for printing, after which they will be distributed to government schools.

Recently RIE and SCERT also held seminars for teachers on the benefits of these worksheets.

“The concept of worksheets is very much in usage in private schools. It’s good that it will now be introduced in government schools to improve their academic performance,” said a resource person engaged in preparing these worksheets said. A senior official said that introducing workshops would help better conceptual learning in classrooms.

Recently, NCERT’s National Achievement Survey for Class3 students ranked Chandigarh 31st of 34 states for its performance in maths skills and 27th for its performance in basic language skills. Meanwhile, SCERT has also begun training primary class teachers to improve their pedagogy skills.